fire ecologyhttp://www.jameybash.com
a personal blog for Jamey HamptonSun, 18 Feb 2018 01:13:55 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.41204098507 Ways To Support Someone Who’s Changing Their Name & Pronounshttp://www.jameybash.com/2018/01/16/7-ways-to-support-someone-whos-changing-their-name-pronouns/
http://www.jameybash.com/2018/01/16/7-ways-to-support-someone-whos-changing-their-name-pronouns/#respondTue, 16 Jan 2018 23:33:59 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=550So, recently you’ve found out some big news about somebody you care about. Maybe they came out to you as transgender and/or non-binary, maybe they’ve told you that they’re changing their name and/or that they’d like to be referred to by a different set of pronouns. Maybe—hopefully!—you want to be supportive of them but you’re worried you’re going to mess up (which is an understandable fear)!

Coming out is hard and the fact that they came out to you is a big deal! You should be proud of them for taking this big step and being honest with you about who they are. Changing the way you think about someone is a process, and you will mess up at some point! However, if you really love and respect this person, you will keep trying, and eventually it will become second nature to you.

As someone who has changed my own name and pronouns, here are some things that I feel are important to keep in mind as you’re getting used to this change.

1. Use the new, correct name and pronouns all the time—even when they’re not there to hear you, even when you’re just thinking about them in your head. This is because the end goal of this process shouldn’t be to retrain yourself to call them a certain thing, it should be to think of them in a certain way. By coming out to you and asking you to use their new name and pronouns, your loved one has shared with you something very real about who they really are. You should be trying to retrain your brain to know them by this name, because it’s their real name—much realer than the one they were being forced to use before.

2. Correct yourself when you get it wrong, even if they don’t say anything. It might be tempting to hope that it just slipped through the cracks and they didn’t notice your mistake. But trust me, they noticed. Being called by the wrong name or pronouns is jarring and painful, but sometimes it’s hard to stand up for yourself and say something.

3. Don’t over-apologize when you mess up! Apologize once, correct yourself, and move on. Apologizing over and over just brings more attention to it than they probably want, and going on and on about how bad you feel for getting it wrong puts pressure on them to comfort you, when this should really be about them and how they feel.

4. Correct other people too! Like I said, it can be very hard to muster the courage to correct people, especially over and over, so having allies in my life who are willing to do that work for me is a godsend. This is a really simple way to take on a little sliver of your loved one’s burden while they’re transitioning. Even a very simple reminder like, “Please don’t forget, Jamey uses they/them pronouns!” can be super helpful and take a lot of pressure off.

5. Be sensitive not to “out” them to people they’re not out to! (This is a caveat to #1 and #4, by the way, because you have to ask them if they’re comfortable with you using their new name and pronouns in front of others.) Coming out is a nerve-racking experience and it’s common not to come out to everyone in your life at once. Outing someone before they’re ready is a terrible, stressful, and sometimes dangerous position to put someone in. Ask who they’re comfortable being out to and be very careful to respect that.

6. Be patient if they change their mind on what they want to be called. It’s really tough to figure out what name and pronouns fit you best and feel the most comfortable without “trying them on” and seeing how it feels when other people use them. Experimentation is an important part of that! If someone changes their name a few times in a row trying to find something that fits, or changes their pronouns but then changes them back, that’s just a natural part of that experimentation.

7. Remember that they’re going through something very personal. Their transition is all about them and what makes them comfortable—not about you and what you think is best. If you don’t think their new name fits them, or if you don’t think the singular they is grammatically correct, or if you think trying to remember their new name and pronouns is too hard… those are all thoughts you should keep to yourself!

Again, coming out is really tough! If your loved one has gathered the strength to come out to you, trust that this is important to them. They know best about what they need to be called to be comfortable and happy. Do your best to put their needs first when it comes to this change and before long, hearing their old name and pronouns will sound almost as wrong to you as it does to them!

]]>http://www.jameybash.com/2018/01/16/7-ways-to-support-someone-whos-changing-their-name-pronouns/feed/0550Magazine Articles, Star Wars Reviews & More!http://www.jameybash.com/2017/12/22/magazine-articles-star-wars-reviews-more/
http://www.jameybash.com/2017/12/22/magazine-articles-star-wars-reviews-more/#respondFri, 22 Dec 2017 16:16:46 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=532Hi friends! I haven’t posted a new article on this blog in a while, but not because I haven’t been active lately, so I wanted to share some of the things I’ve been working on over the past couple months!

I also have a brand new article called “Programming While Trans” in issue 8 of the Recompiler! The Recompiler is another personal favorite magazine of mine and I really admire what they’re doing over there. “Programming While Trans” is a special zine-style article that I drew and lettered in full color by hand, so it’s a really special piece. Issue 8 is also for sale now!

I’ve also recently started writing as a regular contributor to Rogues Portal, doing mainly reviews of comics, video games, books and cartoons, as well as interviews with the creators. I cross-posted my first couple of reviews here but I don’t want to overwhelm this site with every single review I ever write, so I figure periodically I’ll share a wrap up post of all the articles I’ve been working on! Since I do a lot of Star Wars writing for them, I figured this week right after the release of The Last Jedi would be a good week to share!

The story of Luke, Leia and Han Solo striking a blow to the Empire in Star Wars Episode IV is one that we all know and love. But have you ever spared much thought for the less memorable characters? Have you ever wondered why the bartender at the cantina didn’t allow droids in his bar? Have you spent time thinking about what stormtroopers do on their days off? Ever wanted to know the backstory of the red astromech that blew up before it could go work for Uncle Owen? Or even how that tentacle monster got into that trash compactor?

If you’re anything like me and have spent inordinate amounts of time thinking about stuff like this, then you’re in luck. Now that it’s been 40 years since the theatrical release of Episode IV, the Star Wars creative team has given us From a Certain Point of View. This book is a series of 40 short stories wherein we can relive the original story that we love so much.

Since the beginning of the series, Star Wars Rebels’ season finales have been exciting and full of major changes for the show going forward. In season one, that was the death of the Grand Inquisitor. Season two brought us Kanan’s permanent blindness and the fight between Vader and Ashoka (who I do not believe is actually dead – #AshokaLives!) Season three was no exception! By the end of the season, Sabine had returned to Mandalore to help reunite her people, Agent Kallus had defected from the Empire to the rebellion, and Grand Admiral Thrawn had discovered Chopper Base, causing the rebels to flee from their stronghold. Season four, which has been confirmed to be the last season of Rebels, begins in the midst of all these changes.

Now that autumn is here, many of us have been waiting impatiently for the two most important things that happen in the fall: Halloween and the release of Stranger Things Season 2, which was finally released today! Fortunately, Netflix knows us and understands our impatience, so they gave us a gift to tide us over — a retro-style Stranger Things mobile game that came out on October 4th as a surprise release!

Moonstruck, a charming new comic series that mixes the magical and the mundane, debuted this past July. With three issues now on shelves, the story follows two new lovebirds, Julie and Selena (who both also happen to be werewolves), and their centaur friend Chet. Against the backdrop of the cozy coffeeshop where Julie and Chet work, the reader gets to explore the nuances of their daily lives, their excitement, their insecurities and how they stick together as friends when times get tough.

I was so lucky to be able to catch up with writer Grace Ellis and artist Shae Beagle recently via email.

If you’re a fan of indie comics, there’s a lot to be excited about in Toronto. Blue Banshee Press is a new publishing house that started there recently and they’re getting excited to start printing their brand new comic series, Tommy Gun Banshee! Currently running a successful Kickstarter campaign, they are already fully funded and ready to bring their comic to the world. Tommy Gun Banshee is a period piece that follows the story of a legendary hit man working for the Irish mob and the spirit of a beautiful woman who haunts his existence. The art is beautiful, the story is quietly mysterious and the entire piece feels like it was plucked out of the past. We had a chance to chat with two of the creators, writer Miike and artist Todd Sullivan.

I’ve been really enjoying doing some reviews and pop culture pieces. I’ll plan to share them like this from time so it’s clear what I’ve been working on. If there’s any particular pop culture topics that you’d like to see me write about or any particular comics, graphic novels or indie video games that you’d like to see me review, especially those with LGBT representation or by LGBT creators, please drop me a line!

]]>http://www.jameybash.com/2017/12/22/magazine-articles-star-wars-reviews-more/feed/0532Baseball, Lesbians & Friendship all abound in Butterfly Souphttp://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/09/butterfly-soup-review-working-title/
http://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/09/butterfly-soup-review-working-title/#respondMon, 09 Oct 2017 18:15:39 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=514Butterfly Soup is a recently-released indie game which was billed as “a game about gay Asian girls playing baseball and falling in love.” Even though the description of the game was only 12 words long, it was enough for me. I was totally sold. I had to play Butterfly Soup. There was a deep longing for it in my queer soul.

Butterfly Soup was created by Brianna Lei, who’s known for her previous work on Pom Gets Wi-Fi, an adorable RPG about cute dogs on the Internet. Butterfly Soup was released on September 16th for pay-what-you-can with no minimum, so you can pick up the game for free! If you pay $5 or more, you’ll also get a very cute, 30 page PDF that features concept art, creator’s notes and behind the scenes info about some of the characters.

The story follows four Asian American high school girls as they go about their daily lives studying, disappointing their parents, chatting online, playing baseball and figuring out who they really are. It plays more like a visual novel than a true video game. You do get the opportunity to play as all four of the main characters – Diya, Min, Akarsha and Noelle – although choosing differently mainly consists of choosing occasional dialogue options. The story pretty much unfolds the same regardless of what you do.

I still love this game, though! Playing as the different characters lets you glimpse into what they’re thinking and gives you a deeper understanding of what they’re really going through. The art is cute, even if not very interactive, but it also gives the player a great sense for what the characters are like through carefully designed clothes and highly emotive facial expressions.

Like many games about sports, Butterfly Soup isn’t really about sports. It’s a coming of age game at its core and the story it’s telling is all about growing up, exploring yourself and realizing what things are really important to you in life. It delves heavily into issues of familial expectation and depicts characters who feel like they’re under overwhelming amounts of pressure to always be the best. Most importantly, I think, it’s about friendship. The bond that these girls share is special, unique and real. It made me think about and appreciate my own friendships and all the special people in my life who support me.

Character development is where Butterfly Soup really thrives. It really understands what it’s like to be a young kid. The opening scene of the game features a bunch of third graders playing a make believe game. Min wants to be the hero and “save” Diya, so she kills the dragon with a gun that shoots a smaller gun that shoots a knife that explodes. It’s no different when the girls are in high school. Reading their IMs to each other is exactly like reading my IMs to my friends when I was in high school.

The dialogue really captured the whimsy of youth – and was seriously hilarious. I literally laughed so hard at one point that I started to get worried I would suffocate if I couldn’t take a breath soon. I relate to the characters of Butterfly Soup on a spiritual level. They crack jokes to hide their feelings. They pulled the fire alarm to get out of gym class. One of them was so overwhelmed with joy from petting a dog she almost cried. These girls understand me.

And they really do understand me, because the representation in this game is excellent. While the game is marketed as being about lesbians, one of the characters is actually bisexual and she speaks openly about her sexuality, which is refreshing. One of the characters is still realizing that she’s a lesbian, but others already know, are comfortable with themselves and are ready to support their friend coming out, which is great!

There are also different gender identities represented. Although it doesn’t come up explicitly, Min’s discomfort with being associated with traditionally feminine things and preference for using gender neutral bathrooms were striking to me as a nonbinary person. Creator Brianna Lei later confirmed that Min is a nonbinary character. One of the characters is also revealed in the concept art to be a trans girl. Even though it’s never mentioned in-game, I like this kind of representation; being trans doesn’t have to be the most interesting thing about these characters.

It’s not just queer representation at play here either. The fact that the girls are Asian American is central to their characters and their experience, and there’s a range of identities depicted: two of the main characters are Indian, one is Korean and one is Taiwanese. Good representation of Asian American youth is also scarce and Brianna Lei has stated that her inspiration was to make something that accurately reflected her own childhood. I felt fortunate to get a glimpse of that in the game.

Queer representation in video games has been on the rise lately. Several indie games with prominent queer female characters – Life is Strange, Gone Home – have gotten a lot of attention and critical acclaim. Even some bigger name games have gotten on this train, like Overwatch revealing that Tracer is a lesbian.

But all representation is not created equal. Queer media is often haunted by bad tropes that are harmful to the LGBTQ community. So many queer characters are depicted as struggling with their sexuality, being discriminated against, or bullied or disowned because of it. Queer characters also disproportionately die, spawning my least favorite trope: Bury Your Gays. Ambiguity is also a problem in lots of media, where representation is implied but not outright stated, leaving people to wonder and opening the opportunity for homophobic fans to insist that characters are “not really queer.”

While I have a lot of love for Gone Home and Life is Strange, they both fall prey to these sorts of tropes. Butterfly Soup, on the other hand, kills these bad tropes! It lets its characters explore their sexuality in natural ways, finding out things about themselves the beautiful way that all curious teenagers do, and it lets them rejoice in that rather than despair about it. In this sense, the game is a gasp of fresh air.

Verdict
Buy it! Or if you can’t afford that, grab it for free. If you can afford to throw a few dollars at it, supporting independent creators is super important. If you want to laugh until you literally start to worry you might suffocate, this game can’t be missed!

]]>http://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/09/butterfly-soup-review-working-title/feed/0514Doing Queer Representation Right: Moonstruck #1-3http://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/03/doing-queer-representation-right-moonstruck-1-3/
http://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/03/doing-queer-representation-right-moonstruck-1-3/#respondTue, 03 Oct 2017 18:36:38 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=505I discovered Moonstruck this past summer when I was having a particularly bad day and I decided to go to my local comic book store and see if I could find any “cute, queer” comics to cheer me up. Moonstruck delivered on those criteria beyond my wildest dreams, with a splash of magic on the side! This new series from Image Comics features an immersive fantasy world and a wholesome queer romance, all wrapped up into one delightfully dreamy package.

Issue #1 is mainly slice of life, introducing us to a small menagerie of magical creatures and giving us a first glimpse of the enchanting universe they live in. Meet Julie, a soft-spoken and slightly anxious werewolf who loves young adult novels and is enamored with her new girlfriend, Selena. Meet Chet, Julie’s coworker at the coffee shop, an outgoing and gregarious centaur who appreciates puns and the cute minotaur who frequents their cafe. Meet Mark, a cowardly vampire and Lindi, an angry medusa, whose roommate situation has been tense since Mark quit the band.

Getting to know the characters and the casual ways they interact feels natural. The coffee shop setting feels warm, cozy and welcoming, like a favorite sweater. The incredibly charming art, done by newcomer Shae Beagle, enhances that feeling. On top of being adorable, the art is also pretty intricate. I enjoyed flipping through the pages over and over again, eyeing all the cute background characters and wondering about their stories and magical powers.

Naturally, the plot thickens in issue #2. We follow Julie and Selena on their big second date to a stage magic show, accompanied by Chet for moral support. We’re also introduced to a new character, Dorian – a smooth-talking but suspicious fox who has some interesting things to say about the nature of magic.

While still charming, the second issue has a distinctly darker tone, which is reflected particularly in the color palette of the art. In fact, the ominous overtones are so tangible that it’s physically uncomfortable to watch Chet not pick up on them. The suspense builds as Chet blindly acts as the magician’s apprentice – and then it happens. In a puff of smoke, they’re transformed and suddenly sporting human legs instead of their normal centaur bottom half!

Issue #3, which comes out on October 4th, elevates the story to a new level, firmly stepping out of “slice of life” territory and turning into a tale of adventure and intrigue. It opens with Chet mourning the loss of their centaur butt, complaining about how wobbly their new human legs are and lamenting the fact that they now have to wear pants! Oh, the humanity!

The treatment of Chet’s predicament is deeply interesting. Traditionally in many comics (like X-Men, particularly famously), being “cured” of one’s abnormalities is seen as desirable by some – or at least as a moral quandary, where characters are faced with a tough decision regarding being “cured” or not. Chet’s transformation to a human is never portrayed as a “cure” and it’s immediately apparent that this is something they never would have chosen.

Other characters’ reactions are a little more varied: Julie urges Chet to try to get used to their new legs, bringing up their benefits and even using the dreaded “n” word – “You get to be normal now!” Selena, on the other hand, is more proactive and wants to focus on ways to help Chet get their magic back. So we have a transformation where others may see something bad that could be fixed or improved, but Chet doesn’t want to change because they see that piece of themselves as part of their identity… and I can’t help but see a metaphor for the queer experience.

Queer representation is something that I couldn’t talk about Moonstruck without bringing up. It’s impossible to ignore – the three main characters are a lesbian couple and their nonbinary friend! First of all, as a fellow queer person, the accuracy is so good it hurts. One of my favorite lines in the series so far is Chet’s quip, “My gender identity today is terrible puns” – because it’s exactly how my nonbinary friends and I talk to each other at all times.

There’s also a canonical mini-comic about Julie and Selena’s first date, which is as adorable as you’d expect – and includes the unbelievably relatable moment where Julie bursts out in anger, “I JUST WANT TO DRINK COFFEE AND HOLD HANDS WITH A CUTE GIRL!” (Mini issue #0, by the way, is available as a pay-what-you-want download, with all proceeds going to the Hispanic Foundation to help with hurricane relief in Puerto Rico!)

The reason, of course, that the queer characters are so relatable is because they’re written by queer creators; writer Grace Ellis identifies as a lesbian and artist Shae Beagle is nonbinary! Letting queer creators tell the queer stories they want to tell is so important, and it’s how we end up with beautiful pieces like Moonstruck.

The thing that’s so beautiful to me about Moonstruck is how queerness is treated as a non-issue. Nobody, not even anxious Julie, is ashamed of who they are in that regard. No snide comments are made when Julie and Selena are out together. Everyone uses neutral pronouns for Chet without messing up or making a big deal about it. It doesn’t really ever explicitly come up because it doesn’t have to.

We’re so inundated with media that’s about the hardships of being LGBTQ+, so it’s incredibly refreshing to see a series like Moonstruck letting its characters be unabashedly themselves, living their normal queer lives, without struggling with coming out or dealing with discrimination.

That doesn’t mean that the series doesn’t delve into any queer issues! I can see a sort of allegory when I look at the difference between Chet, who is obviously a centaur to anyone who looks at them, and Julie, who tries to repress her werewolf side in order to pass for human. Chet’s centaur-ness is central to their identity but Julie struggles, embarrassed by her wolfish outbursts. Selena seems to be able to change between wolf and human at her pleasure, but Julie only turns in situations of high stress – and she even chastises Selena for changing in public. This definitely mirrors the fear many queer people have of being ostracized, although importantly, this is a wholly internal struggle; nobody except for Julie seems bothered by her wolfishness.

Of course, this metaphor also extends to the themes about being “cured,” which is a historically painful issue in LGBTQ circles, and why it’s such a relief that Chet’s misfortune is widely treated as just that – misfortune.

I also mentioned the words “adventure” and “intrigue” in reference to issue #3! There’s a lot going on in these busy pages, as Julie and Selena attend the Blitheton State University homecoming parade in search for signs of the suspicious stage magicians or any other clues that may help their friend find their lost butt. Shae Beagle’s art is more intricate than ever, with tons of easter eggs and mystical beings to be spotted in the background, from fawns and mermaids to faerie frat-boys to a feather-boa clad Babadook celebrating on the LGBTQ student group float!

I don’t want to give too much away in terms of the story, but the buildup in issue #3 is really rewarding, particularly how all the characters we’ve met in the previous issues are seamlessly intertwined in the action. Everything that happens in this issue happens for a reason and that gives the reader a sense of gravity as it builds up to a final showdown.

Of course, it’s not really a final showdown. In fact, it feels more like an isolated battle at the beginning of a larger and more ominous war that’s beginning to brew. More than ever, the end of the newest issue had me sitting on the edge of my seat, anxious to see what harrowing fate befalls Julie and her crew! But if issue #3 is any indication, these delightful friends care about each other enough that they’re able to tap into a bravery inside themselves that they may not even have realized they had – and that’s the most charming thing of all.

Verdict

Buy it! Do yourself a favor and spend a lazy afternoon in the universe of Moonstruck. Finding a fantasy world this compelling and immersive is a rare gift. Besides, the price of the comic is definitely worth it for the art alone! Supporting queer creators and their work is so important if we want to see more representation in comics in the future!

]]>http://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/03/doing-queer-representation-right-moonstruck-1-3/feed/0505The Memory Archive Wayback Machinehttp://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/02/the-memory-archive-wayback-machine/
http://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/02/the-memory-archive-wayback-machine/#respondMon, 02 Oct 2017 19:20:14 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=495A few days ago, when I was applying to speak at a conference, I went to take a peek at one of my old talk videos on YouTube, I found that one of my Internet Fears had been realized: 4chan had found one of my conference talks. The first thing I noticed was the dire ratio of 15 thumbs down votes to 0 thumbs up votes. Ouch. There was a comment about how my talk “actually wasn’t a bad idea,” but should have been “a side presentation that is not marketed as important.” (Interestingly, I think this person thought he was standing up for me, because he noted that he “couldn’t believe he had to say this,” but that “for once the SJW is okay,” although he also added, “that being said, I would have liked if the presenter did not look like an autist.”) Also, I knew that it was posted on 4chan specifically because someone else helpfully replied, “Yeah dude we all saw your post on /g/ you don’t need to repost it here.” Ouch for everyone involved, I guess.

Anyway, as you can imagine, finding this post took the wind out of my sails when it came to my conference talk. But, it also got me thinking about why. Am I really the kind of person who can’t handle the little number 15 next to the thumbs down icon? Or a comment that was only like, half mean? Saying that my talk should have been marketed as not important was a little brutal, but it’s not like it was the first time I’ve heard that my talk about chronic illness and diversity wasn’t technical enough to belong at a tech conference. I think the thing that bothered me was the realization that people had been discussing me on 4chan without me knowing. It felt almost like being back in high school, knowing that my classmates who didn’t like me were gossiping about me behind my back. Although I know it’s unrealistic, it made me wish I had more control over where my stuff got posted on the Internet… and then suddenly, I was struck by an old memory.

When I was a kid, I loved the X-Files. I seriously cannot express to you the depth of my love for that show when I was in middle school. I also wrote a lot of fanfiction. One day, I found some of my own fanfiction on a review site called, “The Mary Sue Report,” after searching Google for my own name. The entire purpose of this website was to unearth and make fun of bad fanfic featuring “Mary Sues” – original characters added to existing casts who are too competent, too attractive, too desirable and otherwise too perfect. In fairness, my stories were a particularly egregious example of what they were trying to make fun of. They featured a self-insert character with color changing eyes, who was the youngest agent to ever join the FBI, and everyone loved her, and she had a telepathic dog. It was bad, I get it. This is what somebody there had to say about finding and reading my stories: “You know how when you pick up a big old rock in the woods, and you find all of those gross bugs and grubs squirming around underneath it? That’s what it was like, only not really, because bugs are gross in a cool way.” Double ouch.

At the time, I was mortified. I was 12 years old. It had never really occurred to me before that anyone could read the stories I posted AND that they might not be as big fans as my friends, who were all also around 12 years old. I was so embarrassed that I ended up deleting all my fanfiction off the web not too long after. I remember that even at that age, the thing that bothered me so much about it was that anyone could search Google for my name and these awful reviews would come up. I was convinced that this shame would follow me forever, that somehow these reviews would foil my future book deal and career as a novelist. Of course, I was publishing under a cringey fake goth name at the time so it didn’t follow me at all, but this is distinctly the first time I ever remember worrying about my brand, which is something I think about all the time now.

These colorful floppy discs may be the only remaining copy of the fanfiction in question.

Now I’m able to look back and laugh at this story. I know full well that I wrote some truly unfortunate, self-indulgent fanfiction when I was a kid, and I’m not ashamed of that! Still, even when I’m laughing about how embarrassing it was, I have a gut reaction that nobody else can read it ever. To this day, I never shared any of those stories again, not even when my fiancé begged me to let him read it and share in the joke. I started to wonder if this experience affected how I share my work on the Internet even today. These days, I’m pretty open about sharing what I’m working on, so maybe not. Still, I did have a very similar visceral reaction when I found those negative comments on my Polyconf talk, so I think there’s some part of me that’s not quite over it. Even if I’m still ultimately the same oversharer that I always was, I’m sure that other people have been discouraged from going public with their work because of experiences and stories like these.

And for what reason? What are people’s problems anyway? While I wasn’t crazy about the thought of people talking about me on 4chan behind my back, I also never would have realized it was even happening if someone hadn’t chosen to repost his comments on YouTube, where the speaker would conceivably see it. When I think back to the reviews of my fanfic on The Mary Sue Report, I can’t help but wonder: did the presumably grown-ass people commenting there realize that they were tearing apart stories that were written by an 11-year-old? And why did they care so much if my fanfiction was a literary masterpiece or not? Yes, there’s a lot of terrible fanfiction out there, and a lot of it is written by young girls, trying to express themselves doing awesome stuff and being taken seriously by their role models. Seeing older people spewing such negativity about a hobby dominated by young girls really bristles me, particularly since the way young girls express themselves is already so policed in our society. Growing up and finding one’s place in the world is already hard. Who is this bad fanfiction hurting? Who cares if 11-year-old Jamey wanted Fox Mulder to love them, if it made them happy to write about it?

Not only that, but at least in my age demographic, who among us hasn’t posted stuff on the Internet that they’re later embarrassed by? Kids my age grew up having access to the Internet early. I was born in 1990 and have been online since I was 8 years old. And since the technology was new, we didn’t really have anyone to teach us how to use it. Of course I didn’t have a good sense about what I should share, how public it really was, and how long it might continue to persist on the web. None of us did! We’ve pretty much grown up in a world where we all kind of acted like idiots online when we were younger and it’s just something you had to accept. Rebecca Sugar, for example, is 3 years older than me and now known for her work on Steven Universe and Adventure Time. She wrote Invader Zim fanfiction when she was 15 under the pseudonym Muffins Magee, and it was recently unearthed by some of her fans using web archive. And honestly? I loved every second of it and so did most of her fanbase. I think it was a collective sigh of relief as we all realized she was like us when she was younger and it didn’t matter and now she’s doing amazing things.

This is one of my favorite images on the entire Internet.

The fact that fans were even able to find her old work is pretty incredible. It made me start to wonder what traces of my younger self were still searchable online. They say that once you post something on the web, it never really goes away, but I found that wasn’t quite true. Like I said before, I nuked my fanfiction in a fit of insecurity and it’s nowhere to be found now. (I did the same thing with my LiveJournal entries when I was in high school, so that minutiae of my daily life as a preteen also seems to be gone forever.) The only fanfiction I was able to find was a few Matrix stories that were written by an old internet friend. And that only came up because she used some of my characters and credited me using my old pseudonym! Even though it doesn’t exist anymore, I found my old website about Silica Gel via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. I found my old DeviantArt account, where a younger version of myself amusingly lied about being Canadian. I was able to find the bad reviews I mentioned before, but only because I remembered the name of the forum and poked around in their old posts, as it didn’t come up on Google. I also found my name on fanlistings and on other people’s guestbooks. (Remember guestbooks, by the way?) It was all tempered by a sense of nostalgia and the deeply strange realization that 11-year-old me never expected that 27-year-old me would someday be reading my offhand comments about my favorite anime.

Since I shared Rebecca Sugar’s Invader Zim fanart, it’s only fair that I share my own Cowboy Bebop fanart too.

Once you post something on the Internet, you pretty much immediately lose control over where it’s posted and who it’s seen by. That’s a very legitimate thing to worry about and take into consideration before you click that share button! But, it’s also an important thing to consider before being too critical of something you see online. It can be very easy to forget that there’s a real person on the other side of the screen and that can very easily lead us to being harsher than we may have been otherwise. It’s so sneaky that we might not even realize we’re doing it; I used to think it was hilarious to make fun of furries online until one day I woke up and realized that they were all just enjoying themselves without hurting me and oh my God, I was the asshole! I don’t necessarily think the people who made fun of my terrible X Files fanfiction are inherently mean people. I just don’t think they ever considered that the 12-year-old author was reading the things they were saying. And it’s not just my terrible X-Files fanfiction that the world is missing out on. Real art and worthwhile, thoughtful opinions are also being held back for fear of being misappropriated, shared recklessly or made fun of. Sharing our work on the Internet, while often rewarding, is also something that makes us profoundly vulnerable. If we all spent a little more time appreciating that, perhaps we’d be less likely to respond with negativity and we could all feel a little bit more comfortable sending these small pieces of ourselves out into cyberspace.

]]>http://www.jameybash.com/2017/10/02/the-memory-archive-wayback-machine/feed/0495Experimenting with Scarification: Taking Care Of My First Brandhttp://www.jameybash.com/2017/09/18/experimenting-with-scarification/
http://www.jameybash.com/2017/09/18/experimenting-with-scarification/#respondMon, 18 Sep 2017 22:13:56 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=447I’m a huge fan of body mods and over the summer this year, I finally had the opportunity to do a body modification that I’ve had my eye on for many years – I got branded! I’m really interested in scarification because it looks really appealing, it’s not super common and it interacts with your body in an interesting way as it heals. After I got it done, I was looking online for information on how to take care of it or what it should look like during different stages of the healing process, but I was a little surprised by how little information there was out there! I still made it through a speedy recovery but I kept thinking it would have given me a lot of peace of mind to see that it was healing at more or less the rate it should, so I decided to track my entire healing process and put it out there publicly for other people experimenting with this type of scarification in the future. If that’s you, hello and welcome! I hope this is helpful!

Day 0. I found out I was going to have a chance to get my brand done on Sunday morning at a Burning Man regional event and we planned to do it in the early evening, so I had the whole day to look forward to it and psyche myself up! We did it with a hot brand that was heated up using a small kerosene stove. Originally I wanted to put it on my hip, but decided it would be too hard to heal if it was too close to my waistline. I decided to put it on my leg. I wanted it on the back of my calf but was told that wasn’t a good place because the curve of my muscle would prevent the entire brand from touching my skin at the same moment like it has to, so it ended up going on the side of my calf where it’s flatter.

I was a little scared because I knew it was going to be an intense experience. It was intense, but not as extreme as I was expecting because it was over so quickly – the brand was touching my skin for less than a second. After the brand came off, it still hurt but not in the same searing kind of way, plus my adrenaline was flowing at that point. Here’s what it looked like immediately after being done.

Day 0, just minutes after being done

The first night, I put pain relieving neosporin on it and covered it with gauze and medical tape. It definitely ached for the rest of the night, especially when I put weight on that leg, but it wasn’t bad enough to stop me from walking around or anything.

Day 1. By the next morning, I was surprised by how much less it hurt. My friends at the medical tent changed the bandages for me in the morning and then I went home from the burn in the afternoon and picked up more supplies to take care of it at home. I didn’t want to use burn cream or even neosporin in the long term because obviously I wanted it to scar, but I also didn’t want it to dry out and crack and ruin the nice clean lines, so I decided to use petroleum jelly on it going forward.

That night, I changed the bandages myself for the first time. It was totally blistered but completely painless, which kind of freaked me out, but I guess I burned off all the pain receptors!

Day 1

Day 2. Most of the blisters popped in my sleep the second night. Pain was starting to come back at this point, although it still wasn’t as bad as I expected. I could see the burn itself starting to scar a bit, underneath the mostly-deflated blisters, and it was mostly the non-injured skin next to the scar that was really red and angry.

Day 2

Day 3. Pain and feeling still coming back gradually. A little bit of ballooning still in the blister but I think this was the last day of any of that. Skin around still getting redder.

Day 3

Day 4. This was the worst day of pain for me. The pain while it was healing was much less like the searing that happened when I got it done. It was more like a dull achey pain in the entire area. Touching it wasn’t too bad, as long as I was careful, but it hurt to put weight on the leg while I walked. Bandaging it definitely helped! I was trying to strike a balance with how often I bandaged it and how often I let it air out.

By day 4, I was seeing a little bit of blood right around the edges of the burn, but the lines were still very clean.

Day 4

Day 6. Super happy with how it was looking at this point. After day 4, the pain started to slowly fade and I was leaving it uncovered more and more as it felt better.

Day 6

Day 7. Because I was leaving it uncovered more, the scar was starting to dry out and I began getting worried about it cracking – and messing up the lines! Started using the petroleum jelly again at this point.

Day 7

Day 10. Everything was going well! Pain levels were down, the petroleum jelly helped with the dryness and the scar continued to scab over. It was starting to get a little itchy at this point, but people had warned me that it would get very itchy during the healing process and to be honest, I never experienced anything more than mild itchy. Around day 10, when I scratched or rubbed at it, pieces of the scab started to flake and fall off on their own.

The brighter red in this photo was where the scab had already fallen off and those areas were a bit more sensitive to the touch, pain-wise.

Day 10

Day 13. Second round of scabs as the parts that had fallen off re-scabbed over. From the few people I was able to chat about branding with, it seemed like some people preferred to pick the scabs off and re-open the wounds to make it scar more and others just let it alone to heal naturally. I hemmed and hawed about this a little but ended up letting it heal mostly on its own.

Day 13

Day 17. One side healed much faster than the other side and was already pretty much smooth by that point. The side with the scabs was really hard like a shell. It had been pretty much painless for about a week at this point.

Day 17

Day 18. I got sick of the hard-feeling scabs and carefully peeled them off. They bled a little bit and it was sore for the rest of the day but it was still a relief to get rid of them at that point.

Day 18

Day 20. Turned purple and started looking more like a bruise, but was nearly smooth and not really reacting to much anymore. Been painless ever since the soreness when I peeled the scabs. It stayed in this state for a long time, with a couple small scabbed/dry areas that weren’t quite smooth, and the purple faded very slowly to like a pale red.

I kind of stopped taking pictures of it at this point because it was pretty much stable! I considered myself pretty much healed at this point. Day 20 was also the first time I went swimming since I had it done, since I was told not to swim until it was healed, but it seemed fine at that point.

Day 20

Day 34. Even though I had pretty much already considered myself fully healed for the past couple weeks, since I was confident I was past the point where I had to worry about any complications, I remember that this was the first day it felt completely smooth, like there was no scabbing or dryness at all! The brand has fully integrated into my skin and is a part of me now!

Day 34

I hope that this personal account was helpful! I’ve heard some horror stories about brands getting infected and becoming dangerous, but I was confident that I could do it safely if I was careful and I wanted to try to help others be safe and careful too. I had wanted to get branded for years and I don’t regret it at all! My main worry during the healing process was that it would heal too well and not look as dramatic as I’d hoped, but it looks great and I love my brand. I’m looking forward to watching how it continues to heal and fade as the years wear on, although I hope that it stays visible for a good long time! I’m proud of myself for overcoming my fears and getting the brand I always wanted and I’m happy to have an unusual and striking body mod piece to show for it!

The word “dysphoria” is defined as “a sense of being ill at ease or a feeling of dissatisfaction or anxiety.” That’s a pretty good characterization of what gender dysphoria is: feeling ill at ease or dissatisfied with one’s own gender. Most transgender people experience some level of gender dysphoria, and it’s often a huge factor in making the decision to transition (medically or socially) and live their lives as their true gender.

EXPLAIN IT:

There are a couple of different aspects of gender dysphoria: body dysphoria and social dysphoria. When people talk about gender dysphoria, they’re very often referring to the “body dysphoria” aspect—specifically a discomfort with their body, and the gendered characteristics that their body may have.

Of course, body dysphoria manifests very differently in different people. While a lot of people do have dysphoria about their genitalia, that’s certainly not the be-all-end-all. Dysphoria can also manifest around voice, facial hair, or curvy hips. Many trans-masculine people experience dysphoria about how large their chest is, while trans-feminine people often experience dysphoria about how flat their chest is. Some people are sensitive about their height or the size of their hands. Personally, the worst body dysphoria I’ve ever experienced was related to how I perceived myself as smelling. It can really manifest in curious ways—any physical characteristic that might prevent others from perceiving someone as their true gender is fair game for body dysphoria.

As previously mentioned, though, body dysphoria isn’t the only way gender dysphoria manifests. “Social dysphoria” refers to a discomfort with the way other people perceive—and therefore treat—you socially. Some trans people decide not to medically transition (and that’s okay!), but social dysphoria can still be a huge factor in their lives. As a nonbinary person, while I experience some physical body dysphoria, the social dysphoria that happens when I am not recognized as nonbinary is often much more devastating.

What do I mean when I say “the way other people perceive you”? An example might be being referred to by the wrong pronouns or name. For me, being invited to women’s only events, where I don’t feel like I belong, can also cause social dysphoria. Social dysphoria is what makes me worry about my feminine clothes or my colored hair. I’m afraid, despite liking those parts of myself, that they will cause people to perceive me as less masculine.

So, what’s the difference between body dysphoria and social dysphoria? Here’s an example: body dysphoria is when the phone rings, you answer and say hello, and the feminine sound of your voice is jarring and upsetting to you, perhaps like it should be someone else’s voice. Social dysphoria is the awkward moment when the person on the other end of the phone says in a confused voice, “Oh, I thought I was calling someone named James” and you have to reply, “Yes, this is James.”

Some trans people experience all of these aspects of gender dysphoria. Others only experience some. A lot of people experience different ones at different times, with ebbs and flows. No one specific way of experiencing dysphoria is more real or valid than any other way.

“Well, nobody’s really happy with their body, are they? Isn’t that the same as experiencing dysphoria?”

Nope! Gender dysphoria is more than just not liking how you look, and it’s not something that will go away through focusing on body positivity and making peace with yourself. It’s why so many trans people are motivated to come out and transition.

Dysphoria is also not the same as body dysmorphia, which is a symptom associated with eating disorders, categorized by a perception of one’s own body that doesn’t match up with reality (like people thinking they’re heavier when they’re actually underweight). Dysphoria is related to one’s body not matching up with one’s sense of self. This explains why surgery has been proven to be very effective at combating many forms of dysphoria, while this is not the case when combating dysmorphia.

]]>http://www.jameybash.com/2017/09/12/defining-gender-dysphoria/feed/0454The magic behind the curtain — adding multiple orgs to Agrilysthttp://www.jameybash.com/2017/08/23/the-magic-behind-the-curtain%e2%80%8a-%e2%80%8aadding-multiple-orgs-to-agrilyst/
http://www.jameybash.com/2017/08/23/the-magic-behind-the-curtain%e2%80%8a-%e2%80%8aadding-multiple-orgs-to-agrilyst/#respondWed, 23 Aug 2017 04:05:20 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=436Often, making a change to an application can look pretty straightforward from the outside. Without understanding the underlying structure of the application, it can be hard to realize how much functionality it touches.

At Agrilyst, we recently decided to make a change in how we structure users, organizations, and facilities. Originally, user accounts were associated with one organization. Each organization could be associated with multiple farm facilities. Let’s say you operate two distinctly different farm locations: one greenhouse named Starkiller Base in California and one R&D Demo facility in Toronto. In Agrilyst, you can create one organization for your group (we’ll call it Jamey’s Adventures in Farming) and simply add each facility to your organization.

This allows the user to switch between facilities and keep data separate for each. Since organizations could have multiple facilities, it seemed like one organization would be enough for the average farmer — even if they were overseeing multiple farms, they could have a facility for each one and they could still all be contained underneath a single umbrella organization. Simple.

Recently however, we’ve had a few users who we’ll categorize as: franchise farms (we recognize that folks aren’t necessarily creating a real franchise). These folks are owners of a parent company who sell farm systems as a whole. One of our customers in this category is Indoor Farms of America. They sell farm systems for containers, warehouses, and greenhouses. Each farm they set up is its own facility, but it belongs to a separate organization as well. Now we’re talking about multiple organizations each with their own facilities. Having users try to use the site in an unintended way is a really exciting thing because it’s a very clear indicator of their needs and what we can do to improve the platform.

So how do users play into all of this? These franchise farms often work with their various organizations to help them during their early stages of operation and growth. Imagine opening up a new farm and having no knowledge of what to do when something goes wrong. Instead, in the franchise farm model, the parent company is there as a semi-consultant to help growers understand what to do whenever there’s a question. Now imagine the parent company gets access to each organization’s dashboard (with their permission) so they can predict things ahead of time as well as find ways to improve real-time.

We loved that idea. So we decided to change our organization structure so that users can be associated with more than one organization within Agrilyst.

This may not seem like a huge change. In fact, from the perspective of a user on the front-end, the updates are extremely minimal. If a user has access to more than one organization, the facilities they can view are still listed on the facility dropdown, but they are sorted by which organization they belong to.

Prior way of doing things

New multi organization view

To keep it simple, even adding someone new to your organization works exactly the way it did before. The form below originally functioned only to send out an email invitation to create a new user account. Now, in addition to that, it can also detect if the email you entered already has an existing Agrilyst account. If an account already exists, Agrilyst will create an association directly between the existing organization and your new one. And the user interface didn’t change at all!

So from the user side, it’s barely noticeable if you’re not looking for it, but the change to the back-end codebase was pretty major! The user and organization structure really existed as part of the backbone of the application, so updating it touched a lot of different functionality, and was integrated very tightly with user registration and how we determine what facility should be active for the user. Organizational settings are tied up in this, and so are user roles, since now a single account can have separate roles for the different organizations they belong to (which means you can be a Grower at Organization A but only an employee at Organization B, and that affects what you can view and edit in the system).

It’s important to always keep in mind the potential disconnect between the appearance of change on the front-end of the application and the level of interconnectedness of the same feature on the back-end. Always being aware of how different pieces of Agrilyst integrate with and affect each other gives us confidence that updating the site to better serve our users won’t cause any unforeseeable issues elsewhere — which means more new features without risking any of the current functionality, which makes Agrilyst what it is, or disrupting the work of the growers who rely on it.

Agrilyst is the virtual agronomist powering the horticulture industry. We invite you to join the #DigitalHorticulture movement on social media and share your stories of farm innovation. This article was originally posted on The Greenhouse.

]]>http://www.jameybash.com/2017/08/23/the-magic-behind-the-curtain%e2%80%8a-%e2%80%8aadding-multiple-orgs-to-agrilyst/feed/0436Conf Report: PolyConfhttp://www.jameybash.com/2017/08/21/conf-report-polyconf/
http://www.jameybash.com/2017/08/21/conf-report-polyconf/#respondMon, 21 Aug 2017 22:33:04 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=426Of all the conferences I was scheduled for this spring, I think Polyconf was the one I was most excited about! First of all, this year it was held in beautiful Paris, France which is one of my favorite cities in the world and the farthest I’ve ever traveled to speak, so of course I was excited about all of that! Also, Polyconf’s method of choosing speakers isn’t something I had encountered before and I really liked it. Basically, they posted all of the proposals they received and let the community vote on which talks they’d most like to see! A number of the top voted ones were invited to attend the conference as speakers. This is how I got my invitation, as the second highest voted talk (!!!) and I was super honored to have been chosen by the community. Sometimes I also get nervous about giving soft talks at conferences because I worry that people won’t be as interested in them as technical talks, so it was really reassuring to see that there were a lot of people already interested in my topic!

Plus, the conference took place at La Geode, which was an incredible venue! I don’t think I will ever speak at a place this neat ever again as long as I live.

I like the concept of Polyconf – it’s a polyglot conference with the slogan “Never see boundaries, but only horizons.” It was an honor to speak alongside so many talented programmers and speakers. And my talk went over really well, even though the stage made it pretty intimidating! I’ve never felt so small in comparison to my slides.

Of course, one of the best thing about speaking at conferences is getting to see the other amazing talks by the other talented speakers. Eryn O’Neil’s talk about how to be effective as a tech lead was an illuminating look at the human side of software engineering, which I think is super important and under-discussed. My absolute favorite talk, hands down, was Anjana Vakil’s talk about programming paradigms. It was an incredibly insightful look at the differences and similarities of the languages we use. In fact I don’t even know how to describe it exactly, other than to encourage everyone to do yourselves a favor and watch it.

Polyconf was my first conference outside of North America and as an American, I was a pretty small minority. Being able to meet people from all over Europe was really great and the discussions we had about code and the industry and politics were really fascinating because everyone brought such different perspectives to the table. I felt really privileged to be part of those discussions!

Plus, Paris is one of my favorite cities in the world. After a busy weekend networking at the conference and fretting about my talks, spending a couple days exploring Paris completely on my own was very cathartic.

Polyconf was my last conference of my spring season and it was truly a grand finale for me. All of my thanks to Zaiste and the other organizers for planning it, inviting me and helping me to feel welcome. I’m looking forward to recharging for the next few months and doing some new talks in the fall!

]]>http://www.jameybash.com/2017/08/21/conf-report-polyconf/feed/0426Greater Than Code, the podcast where #PeopleMatterhttp://www.jameybash.com/2017/08/17/greater-than-code-the-podcast-where-peoplematter/
http://www.jameybash.com/2017/08/17/greater-than-code-the-podcast-where-peoplematter/#respondThu, 17 Aug 2017 13:35:25 +0000http://www.jameybash.com/?p=420Earlier this summer I was approached with a very exciting proposal from a friend who I met at AlterConf NYC last winter and asked to become a regular panelist on Greater Than Code. I was really honored to have been asked and really excited to get to work closely with a panel of such intelligent, talented and insightful people.

If you haven’t heard of Greater Than Code, it’s a podcast that you definitely need to get on your list – and not just because I’m working on it now! It’s a podcast about technology but more importantly, it’s about the humans that are behind the technology we use. We believe that the story of how the people behind the code got to the place they are today is an integral part of understanding the awesome projects that they work on. I believe this wholeheartedly, so that’s part of why I was so excited to be a part of the show. Even as a new panelist, I feel really lucky to have gotten to participate in some really amazing conversations and learned a lot, both from my fellow panelists and the amazing guests we’ve had on the show.

We have tshirts now! Here I am repping >Code outside of Cowork Buffalo

So far, my first three episodes as a panelist are available if you’d like to give them a listen! Episode 40: F*ck It and Be Nice featured Jenn Schiffer and Jessica Lord and focused on the way we treat each other within the tech community, particularly on Twitter, and the unfortunate ways that we’ve normalized putting one another down. Episode 42 was about Carina Zona and the work she’s done with CallbackWomen, which has been a really helpful resource for me as I’ve been starting my career as a conference speaker! We talked a lot about what conferences can be doing to make their events more inclusive and inviting to women and other minority genders. Episode 43 is a personal favorite of mine so far and it’s about how accessibility issues affect the designing and playing of board games. We had a really interesting chat with James Edward Gray and Mischa Lewis-Norelle that is highly recommended listening from me!

I’ve done work on podcasts before and I really enjoy it but I have to admit that stepping into an already well established show like Greater Than Code has been a really new experience for me! I was handing out stickers at Polyconf last month and it was super interesting to talk to people who already know and love our show, especially before my first episode was even available! I’m really looking forward to being a part of more episodes and events in the future, especially since we have some really good topics coming up! Plus, we’re always looking for more guests and we’re even hoping to add another permanent panelist soon, preferably a woman of color, so if you want stickers or know anybody who’d be interested, please feel free to hit me up!

Also, If you like Greater Than Code, please consider supporting us financially! The more support we have on our Patreon, the more awesome things we can make for you and the more often we can release episodes of the show! Also, being a Patron gets you access to interesting, behind the scenes content that doesn’t make it into the show, like a cool discussion about gender signifiers in video games that was had during the break of episode 43. I feel really good that we’re doing good work in the tech industry, but if we want to be able to continue and expand, we’ll need everyone’s help. Thanks!